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Month: December 2017

On the anniversary of transitioning to living as a woman full-time, rather than celebration, I’ve mostly been feeling the “is that all there is?” blues.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t regret transitioning, not for a second. And I did it being well aware that transitioning (hopefully) resolves your gender issues, but you’re still you, and you’ll still be left with your other issues.

Partly it’s the season. I probably have a touch of Seasonal Affective Disorder, and the short days and long nights just make me want to hibernate.

Plus it’s the holiday season with all the pressure that puts on people to feel joyous, even when they’re feeling far from it. Especially for those of us for whom family reunions are more stressful than celebratory. To be honest, for various reasons each year, I haven’t had a joyous holiday season in at least a decade, and this one I’ve been both stressed out and sick once again.

Partly it’s looking back and realizing that 2017 has really sucked due to some pretty severe nerve pain problems. Both the problems in themselves, but also how they’ve kept me isolated.

But a big part of it is now that my #1 challenge has been resolved, it’s allowed other issues to surface.

In some ways I’m now less comfortable in my body than before. The contrast between who I am, and what my body is, have become sharper. As Sam Dylan Finch said in his excellent essay, “I’m Transgender And I Need Body Positivity Too,” it’s not that I hate my body per se. Much as it can be frustrating to live in at time thanks to some chronic health issues, it’s otherwise served me well. Rather, as Finch says, “It’s about hating what my body has come to symbolize… the way it tricks others into seeing me as something that I’m not.”

I’m exceedingly thankful for the my new face, courtesy of my my surgery in Argentina last January. I can look in the mirror now and see a woman’s face. It’s at the point where my face in pre-surgery photos is the one that looks a bit alien and “not me.”

But the rest of my body…. There’s some parts that I’ve mostly made peace with. Mostly. I will never have hips that balance out with my wide child-bearing shoulders. My hands and feet will always be big, making it difficult to find jewelry and shoes that fit. I continue to need to do facial electrolysis twice a week, with no end in sight.

And now that breast augmentation is at the “so close, but yet so far” stage — hopefully I’ll be having it done early next year — my body dysphoria about that has gone through the roof. I still feel more caterpillar than butterfly. I’ll get there, but there’s that surgery and another next July, the latter with a tough recovery that’s going to sideline me again for the latter half of 2018.

I’m also really starting to feel the financial pinch of doing the things I need to do to make my body congruent with who I am. When all is said and done, it’ll cost me more than $100,000, with a good chunk of that coming up next year. It will be money well spent, and trust me I know how privileged I am to have the financial resources to make it happen. But still…. It’s wiping out a lot of savings, when I’m at an age where one starts thinking about having enough money for retirement down the road.

But probably one of the biggest issues is dealing with the loneliness in my life. Much of it my own doing — for decades I distanced myself from others because if I didn’t let anyone in, they couldn’t hurt me. I’m working on letting the armor down, but it’s harder to make friends in your 50s, especially out in the suburbs. Harder still when the people I am friends with are 30+ miles away up in SF and Oakland. Also, despite all the talk of sisterhood, burly friendships can be a mile wide, and an inch deep. (I’m grateful to the folks who did reach out when I was sidelined.) And yes, I know I need to force myself to get out more. That’s in the plans, and hopefully health problems won’t sabotage that again.

There’s also recent work with my therapist, that’s made me realize there’s things about my own ways of interacting with other people that need to change. Tired of being the long-suffering friend, the long-suffering co-worker, of always ending up having to be the responsible adult. The person who’s always there for others, but not necessarily there for herself. Growth is good, but sometimes it’s also a bit painful.

All that said, while I may be having All The Feels at the moment, things will get better. Changing some of the problematic parts of my life may be challenging, but at least I know that they need changing. I’ve been through worst. I’m high functioning and I’ll power through things. I’ll just keep dancing. If that’s all there is.

One year ago today, I picked up the court order changing my legal name and gender — the penultimate step before living as me full-time.

Looking at my post about this from last year, I can’t believe how ecstatic I looked. It truly was a milestone. I thought about sharing that post, but honestly, it has a photo with a face that doesn’t feel like me anymore, between hormones and facial surgery. (A subject that’s probably worth a post in itself for another day.)

I still have some parts of my life (various bills, legal documents, etc.) with my old name on them — with the health problems this year, I just wasn’t up to dealing with bureaucracies — so cleaning the loose ends is going to be a priority in the next month or two.

So I’ve started interviewing surgeons to do breast augmentation. It’s honestly the part of my body I feel most dysphoric about, more than my face was, more than my nether regions.*

Not having them** bothers more than I’d even realized. One of the surgeons had an opening in late December, and I wanted sign up for it right then and there. Hell, I was ready to go under the knife the following day.*** Aching was the best way to described.

I realize there’s other women who are unhappy with their breasts, but in my case Teh Tranz adds an extra level of discomfort.

As Sam Dylan Finch said in his excellent essay, “I’m Transgender and I Need Body Positivity Too,” it’s not that I hate my body, rather:

“It’s about how invisible my body makes me feel — the way it tricks others into seeing me as something that I’m not.

And no amount of self-love and validation can change the fact that, when I step out into the world, my body precedes me and erases a very important aspect of my identity.”

This is where the language of body positivity — e.g. “you’re perfect just the way you are,” “you should ignore society’s messages,” etc. — falls flat with me, and with other trans people.

I’m not looking forward to the next two rounds of surgery in the coming year — nor the months of after-care after the second one — but I am looking forward to the changes they’ll bring, to them helping what’s on the outside feel congruent with what’s on the inside.

There are prices to be paid physically, emotionally, and especially financially — since probably none of the renovations will be covered by insurance. But peace of mind is priceless.****

———

*Standard caveat about how if you’ve met once trans person… you’ve met one trans person, and every trans person feels differently about their body

**Thanks to hormones, I’ve actually developed what’s probably are probably A+/B- sized breasts. But given my frame, they look tiny by comparison.

***I didn’t, much as I wanted to, because he’s a celebrity surgeon and his price was far steeper than I’d expected.

****I’m fully aware that I’ll still probably face the same sort of body image issues that most women in our society face — in fact I’m already dealing with them. But it won’t be with the extra dose of gender dysphoria.

TFW when the woman at the next table, who you’ve been chatting with, compliments you on your voice and asks if you do radio work.

She was right in a way… as a man I had a deep and resonate voice — think of the DJ from “K-Billy’s Super Sounds of the Seventies” in “Reservoir Dogs.” Consequently, I’ve spent the last two years working with a speech therapist to change it.

My voice is still one the things I’m most self-conscious about, and it’s still one of the things that causes me to be misgendered — it’s a given that I’ll get referred to as “sir” when I’m on the phone with someone who doesn’t know me.

Unfortunately, with everything else that’s been going on this year, I just haven’t had enough time to practice to really get my voice where I want it to be. I’ve more or less gotten the change from chest resonance to head resonance; on a good day my pitch is an octave higher where I want it; and I’m able to do the 180-degree change in inflection between men’s speech and women’s speech. But it still takes conscious effort and all too often, the latter two slip a bit.

So it’s nice, really nice, to know that sometimes it all comes together.